A company in Croydon that builds truck bodies has been fined after a worker’s leg was crushed by almost 4 tonnes of steel sheets. The incident happened when Andrew Trotter, a self-employed lorry driver from Stoke-on-Trent, was working alongside a number of employees of Thompsons (UK) Ltd in January 2012. Mr Trotter had delivered a number of packs of steel sheets in his flatbed lorry, and workers at Thompson were unloading the packs using a complex tandem lift by two counter-balanced forklift trucks. The group was re-loading the packs onto a separate lorry and they were going to be taken to the firm’s factory, however, the load was unbalanced and as one pack was being placed on top of another, a wooden baton became dislodged and a six-metre steel sheet pack started to slide. The corner of the pack struck Mr Trotter before it hit the concrete floor.
Mr Trotter fractured his leg and suffered muscle damage as a result of the incident. He is limited with regards to the movement of his knee and ankle and has since needed to return to hospital for treatment for the swelling of his leg.
Thompsons (UK) Ltd were investigated by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) and in October 2013, Westminster Magistrates’ Court heard HSE found a lack of planning led to Mr Trotter being able to work so close to the lorry. The court heard how the tandem lift, which was a complicated procedure, had not been supervised or sufficiently planned and had it been controlled and directed correctly, the risk to the workers would have been significantly reduced.
The company was fined £14,000 along with £11,284 after admitting that it breached the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations as well as a separate breach of the Lifting Operations and Lifting Equipment Regulations.
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